Friday, March 22, 2013

Minimalism: Term used in the 20th century, in particular from the 1960s onward, to describe a style characterized by an economy of forms, no traces of the artist’s hand, and industrially processed materials. More at the Tate Glossary.

New Image Painting: Term applied since the late 1970s to the work of certain painters who work in a strident figurative style, often with cartoonlike imagery and abrasive handling owing something to Neo-Expressionism. More at the-artists.org.

German Expressionism: Expressionism in the fine arts developed from the Symbolist and expressive trends in European art at the end of the 19th century. The period of "classical Expressionism" began in 1905, with the foundation of the group Die Brücke, and ended c. 1920. Although in part an artistic reaction both to academic art and to Impressionism, the movement should be understood as a form of "new Humanism," which sought to communicate man’s spiritual life. In order to communicate the human spiritual condition the Expressionists made use of new, strong, assertive forms, often violently distorted, symbolic colors, and suggestive lines. Their work also showed an interest in Primitivism. More at MoMA's online collection.

Actionism: English version of general German term for Performance art, but was specifically used for the name of the Vienna-based group Wiener Aktionismus founded in 1962. The principal members of the group were Gunter Brus, Hermann Nisch, and Rudolph Schwarzkogler. Their "actions" were intended to highlight the endemic violence of humanity and were deliberately shocking, including self-torture, and quasi-religious ceremonies using the blood and entrails of animals. More at the Tate Glossary.

Vienna Actionists: The work of the Viennese Actionists is probably best remembered for the wilful transgressiveness of its naked bodies, destructiveness, and violence. Often, brief jail terms were served by participants for violations of decency laws, and their works were targets of moral outrage. More from Wikipedia.

Drypoint: Printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate (or "matrix") with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point.

Neo-Expressionism: This term came into use in about 1980 to describe the international phenomenon of a major revival of painting in an Expressionist manner. It was seen as a reaction to the Minimalism and Conceptual art that had dominated the 1970s. More from the Tate Glossary.